Next summer, we will have the Women's World Cup taking place and like with every major competition, FIFA will send its best officials. Well strike that, FIFA will send their best female officials which not necessarily equate to having the best officials there. Now, before anyone reads that comment as some form of sexist commentary on the quality of female officials or that somehow I am against all female officials at a women's event, stop ! I am fully supportive of having only female officials, in fact I consider it a necessity. It is something that I advocated for during our university national championships.
Having FIFA send all female officials, represents FIFA's effort to improve opportunities for women in the game by mandating all officiating of the games to be overseen by women. Yes is encouraging to see FIFA supporting its manifesto of "the future of football is feminine." But in reality, and not of their own doing, some of these referees, particularly those without high-level national soccer league work, lack the experienced eye needed to handle the increased speed of the attack, aggressive play and competitive intensity inherent to a top level competition like the Women's World Cup. Many would argue FIFA should have hired the best referees, period. Simply put, these were not the 22 best referees in the world. The problem arises from the inconsistencies that exist across different countries in terms of supporting, training and developing female officials. The lack of female officials is in fact not very different from the lack of female coaches. The decisions makers remain mostly male and they control access to coaching and refereeing roles, those doing the training and certification for both remain predominantly make and therefore the barriers in both roles remain. The situation of all female referees is not new or recent, in fact since 1999, the every women's World Cup has featured all female referees. This was a done as a means to ensure that the game's top competition also be a showcase for the games top female officials. One would assume like all top competitions, the expectation has been to ensure top quality standards across all areas of officiating. One would assume the some sort of selection process has taken place at prior competition and will take place ahead of next summer and who like with the men's tournament, will part in a comprehensive program to ensure that they are in peak condition and as well-prepared as possible. However, from which pool of potential officials will these referees be selected? How crucial is getting the best referees for a competition of this level ? The point here isn't to harp on human error, every official is doing their best, and it isn't really even about the gender of the referees. It's about the incredible importance of getting calls right on the game's biggest change. At the World Cup, officials often are the most important people on the field, for their mistakes have the potential to not only change the outcome of the game but also affect the long-term health of soccer in affected countries. With limited resources already being invested by different countries in their women's' national programs, many women's soccer programs rely heavily on FIFA award money to boost year-round training, specifically to help put resources toward Olympic training for those that will qualify since the world cup determines access the games which always take place in the year following a world cup. The women's professional game has not yet grown to a level where women can make a living solely from their playing salaries. In the build up to a world cup, and the year between a World Cup and the Olympics, reality is that most likely a majority of women's soccer players will typically be compensated only with stipends/ grants or endorsements from businesses that sponsor the team. So you can see how every round of advancement at a World Cup has an enormous impact on the overall support levels. If this advancement is affected by a blown call during a game, it can have a huge financial impact for certain teams or players. So taking all that into account, one could argue that if the game truly requires the best ( and by best let's say most experienced ) officials, then why not have male officials ? Well here is the simple answer, because if you use that excuse, what will the motivation be for the governing bodies to invest more resources in training female officials to become better? If you make it ok for males to referee the women's top competition, you create the precedent that there is no need to invest in female refs. As I started earlier in this piece, the issue of having all female officials at the World Cup started in 1999, that is almost two decades. So is it an issue? If it is, how come, knowing the FIFA wants all female officials, why hasn't the problem gotten better ? Here is my perception of the situation. The women's game has grown tremendously in the last 2 or 3 decades worldwide. However, it has not grown consistently across all countries. Officials in certain countries who achieve a certain ranking have the chance to regularly work female games of a certain level while in others they don't. If I go back 20 years, which in the big scheme of things is not a huge amount of time, the measure of a female referee being good was measured in her ability to work a men's game and in contrast for a male referee, having to work a female game was somehow seen as a demotion. Female officials working some 3rd division men's game were somehow seen as being more competent than a woman working a World Cup or women's international. As if somehow, working a men's game was the goal of female refs. The reality is that there are some many more men's game taking place day in day out, so any female official who is deemed "qualified" to work at a men's game has a greater opportunity of working regularly and be default getting a better compensation from refereeing. I think that the issue of women as soccer referees is no different than the discussion about women on coaching or administrative roles with the game of soccer. The role of gender is a popular topic of discussion in soccer and soccer media coverage, but often ignored when talking about referees. This is likely the case because female referees are almost nonexistent at the professional level and exceedingly scarce at the local, university, and national levels. While the number of female and male youth athletes is roughly equal, a significant disparity exists in authoritative roles (referees and coaches). The primary reasons for the scarcity of women in refereeing goes back to the same barriers that exist for coaching, the decision-makers remain primarily male. In addition with the growth of female professional leagues, top drawer competitions and related revenue possibilities, male refs see it as an additional source of income (much like occurs with coaching) so even though they might not see officiating a women's game as ideal, it still allows them to work as a ref and further their development. However, there may even be a much more basic which leads to a lack of interest for females to get into refereeing. First, all referees regardless of gender must start officiating at the youth level. Most coaches are males, and from experience, I can assume that they are more willing to intimidate a female referee than a male referee. Whether female referees are subject to more verbal abuse on the field than male referees, might be hard to accurately access but if true, female referees may feel more intimidated by male coaches and players, and as a result, display less confidence in their calls. Over time, they simply might lose interest and therefore walk away, which at the starting point, decreases the pool of female refs in which to invest for development. With this argument, the scarcity of female referees creates an unfortunate Catch-22: with such a small pool, less women are likely to begin officiating and those that do will may not want to stay with it. If the barrier to progressing remain in place as female officials move up through the ranks, the numbers continue to dwindle and the pools gets further diminished. Therefore, I think that it is imperative to develop strong mentoring programs for female referees, given by accomplished female referees. Ideally, refereeing in soccer would be gender blind. When we could discuss the issue of having the best refs for a game, that would include having a female referee doing a men's game because she is simply the best. To help female officials become the best, I have no issue with female competitions using female officials exclusively. Referees at any level, of any gender are not perfect, mistakes with happen, accept them and move on. Yes, when it is your team involved who faces the consequences, it sucks, but to use the argument that having a better ref ( read a male one) that mistake wouldn't happen is simply to prolong the stereotype that somehow a female ref can't somehow be competent. Asking for all female officials at top level competitions isn't new so instead of resisting the initiative, buy into it and insist on equitable investment of their development. As a top down approach, the top officials in the women's game need to be identified and steps should be taken to ensure they can work regularly at high level game so that when they will arrive at the World Cup they are ready. Perhaps having these officials work within selected countries women's pro leagues through this winter season so that they are working games regularly. I am sure it will ruffle feathers of local officials ( read male one mostly) who might lose out on games and therefore pay but if the decision makers are truly serious about developing female officials, they need to use every possible avenue and not just rely of each country to develop their own, because as we see with investment in national teams, there remains a huge disparity. I will however highlight one exception for the short term for using female officials exclusively. This summer's Men's World Cup saw the introduction of VAR . video assistant referee. This technology is being rolled out at various levels of soccer. If the goal for a World Cup is to ensure the right calls are being made regardless of gender then if VAR is good enough for the men's competition, it is right for the women. So far, the argument for not using VAR next summer is that there may not be sufficient time for women to be trained in the use of VAR. If VAR is now considered an integral part of the game, then not using it for the highest level of competition on the women's side is simply another type of gender in equity. If for next summer that means using the men already trained in the use of VAR, then so be it. After all, the main goal is to make sure that games are won or lost on the field by the play of the teams and determined by a missed or wrong call. I don't consider it inconsistent to continue wanting all female on field crews and males working the VAR. It respect the ideal if promoting females in officiating and getting the calls right.
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AuthorAfter many years of coaching at various levels and with different teams, I thought I would share some of my experiences and thoughts about coaching. Archives
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